Eoin Morgan gives England crucial push to victory over South Africa

Eoin Morgan played a leading role in England's victory over South Africa in the third One-Day International at The Oval. Photograph: Olly Greenwood/AFP/Getty Images

Well, that feels a bit better. For the first time this summer England's cricketers – terribly beleaguered off the pitch, aggressively outperformed on it – finally laid a glove on South Africa. A fluent innings of 73 off 67 balls from Eoin Morgan in front of a boisterous Friday night Oval crowd played a major hand in steering Alastair Cook's team to a comfortable four-wicket victory, their first win of any kind against South Africa on this tour. The result leaves the one-day series level at 1-1 with two matches to play. For what it is worth, it also returns England to the summit of the ODI rankings, a single victory enough to bump them all the way up from third. The new-ish era starts right here.

If Cook was unable to play a significant innings in his first match since becoming Test as well as one-day international captain, he was delighted by the response of his bowlers in restricting South Africa to 211 all out from 46 overs. Jade Dernbach, who bowled with great penetration and familiar slippery variety, was the pick of a well-balanced attack. "It's been a tough summer against South Africa and to finally win means a lot to the guys tonight," Cook said. "All our bowlers bowled well but especially Jade. He came on and took big wickets and that was one of the big differences. We kept on picking up wickets when we needed them."

England's victorious run chase was anchored by a measured partnership of 108 between Morgan and Jonathan Trott, who was eventually out for 71. Roared on by a thirsty half-day full house England had seemed to be chugging along comfortably enough at 45 for one after 10 overs when Cook, out of the blue, played a horrible pull shot to a feeble half-tracker from Robin Peterson, spooning the ball to Dean Elgar at deep midwicket. Before long the score was 64 for three after a moment of mild controversy. Ravi Bopara was given out caught behind driving at Morne Morkel, the dismissal confirmed after a referral despite no evidence of bat-contact on Hotspot. Bopara, who has endured a torrid summer away from cricket, lingered to debate the issue with Kumar Dharmasena. On television Snicko, which is not available to the fourth umpire, suggested a clear nick.

And so England's two highest averaging ODI batsman of all time, Trott and Morgan, set about reeling in what always looked a straightforward chase. Morgan's ODI batting has lost a little of its early magic dust – this was only his second half-century this year – but here he was quickly into a familiar stride, sending those familiar laser-guided offside crunches to the fence and swatting Elgar's soft-pedalled left-arm spin over midwicket for the only six of the match. Trott's 50 arrived off a snail's pace 86 balls with two fours: exactly what England needed. Morgan got there off 54, a lovely innings, and perhaps he is now decisively through the technical cramps and general sense of drift that have dogged his progress. England would dearly love him to return in earnest as a batsman who can fill a slot in the longer form. With 40 runs required he departed, skying a swipe off Peterson, before Trott was caught behind leaving Samit Patel to swat the winning runs.

Earlier in the day South Africa had won the toss and batted under a mist of high cloud on a slow-paced Oval surface. James Anderson bowled Graeme Smith playing what was an ugly swipe even by ugly swipe standards and Dernbach uprooted Hashim Amla's middle stump with the first ball of his second spell for a top-scoring 43. If Dernbach's celebration was the familiar delirious yodelling sprint his exuberance shows the premium England place on Amla's wicket. Perhaps they have finally worked out how to get him out: send down something near unplayable that tails in from outside off stump to beat that distinctive whiplash leg-side force.

A partnership of 47 in nine overs between Elgar and AB de Villiers was broken by the steady James Tredwell as England kept chipping away. The ball Dernbach got Elgar with was another peach, a back of the hand slower ball, the batsman undone by the most enigmatic of variations. Bopara's spell of 10 overs and one for 31 was wily and Anderson wrapped up the tail with three for one in eight balls as South Africa's last eight wickets went down for 91.

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